I’m going to be hanging out with a neighbor today to do crafts and I am inordinately excited about it. My social circle up here is virtually nonexistent aside from some of our D&D group, so I’ve got a bit of childlike glee going on when I meet someone I vibe with.
So now I need to figure out some appropriately fun shenanigans to pull with this creepy doll before next session.
I love playing these games so much.
I use randomly-generated loot tables for the #ttrpg I run, and it came up with a "talking doll" as loot for an encounter that happened to be in a zombie-infested basement. I thought that was funny, because like who in their right mind would take a talking doll that they found in a zombie basement? I am a FOOL, it turns out, because my players - in their infinite wisdom - were immediately like "hell yeah we'll take the talking doll from the zombie basement."
Now that I have Xounds to add back the old Platinum Sounds from Mac OS 8.5, it feels so weird and incomplete to use a computer without them.
Asparagus in gouache and colored pencil. #TraditionalArt #MastoArt
I get winter doldrums so bad that I start dreading it in late October, but there is a very specific time of early autumn that I *love*, and we're in it right now in southeastern Pennsylvania. Crisp mornings, bright blue skies, lots of beautiful and worth appreciating.
Xounds Redux is wonderful! I missed these weird little sounds from the old Mac OS days. https://paradisefacade.com/software
A quick sketch of our tiny little baby boy Chara while he naps. #MastoArt #CatsOfMastodon
Every once in a while, YouTube pulls something out of its archive that is laser-focused on me. https://youtu.be/8MLDT5-ZgN0
Over the last year in particular, I've developed a visceral negative reaction to franchises like Star Trek and Star Wars constantly fellating themselves for how good their products from decades ago were.
This revulsion, apparently, does not apply to Blizzard and World of Warcraft.
I don’t like that LLMs have made me immediately distrust writing with organized headlines, bullet points, and bold for emphasis. Now, if I’m reading something and the grammar is correct, I have to worry that it’s going to be an over-verbose waste of my time.
I forgot that this used to be table stakes.
Not just that! The funny moments ENHANCE the characters because we know multiple sides of their personality by the time they do something drastic.
I’ve been watching so much new-era Star Trek and playing so much WoW that it’s such a freaking breath of fresh air to watch a show that is well-planned and can also be funny but in a way that doesn’t undermine the characters.
We’ve been (re- in my case) watching Babylon 5 and, boy, this show holds up even better than I’d have excepted.
We can all use some cozy train nerdery going into the weekend. https://youtu.be/F18SQ8Uo3ns
That’s even setting aside that it’s the language of the enemy as the default look for LLM-laundered web pages.
If I never again see a UI/web design that’s supposed to be blooming neon lights on a black background, it’ll be too soon.
Somehow, now, my two most valuable possessions are my mortgage refinanced in 2021 and the 128GB of RAM I bought in 2024.